May 7, 2008 -  June 11, 2008
B. Tim Groen
You Happy Now / Recent Work

Ivy Brown Gallery is happy to present You Happy Now, an exhibition of new work by B. Tim Groen. The title draws its name from Reposing on The Road To Joy, one of the works included in the show. Working directly on headshop posters and vintage photographs, the mixed media works on paper and on board Groen has made over the last three years are inspired by his memories of growing up as a suburban hippy child in Amsterdam.

“Without trying to be literal”, Groen explains, “I tapped into memories of everything I was surrounded with as a kid, ranging from psychedelic events and visuals to mainstream magazine advertising. In a way some of these pieces are about that moment when hippie culture largely ceased to be an ideology and became a mainstream style phenomenon.” As soon as Groen was old enough to realize what had happened “at the end of the golden hippie-era”, he realized that a very specific and – for lack of a better word – precious period had passed.

B. Tim Groen’s work lies between graphic design, illustration and art. He has created installations and advertising campaigns for Barneys New York, as well as images for many other clients including MTV Networks, Maybelline, Levi’s, Habitat UK and The New York Times Magazine.

A native of Amsterdam, where he attended the Gerrit Rietveld Academy of the Arts, B. Tim Groen has divided his time during the last ten years between the United States and Europe.